Staple Head Jones

Column #8 (Originally published in Rugby, Vol. 22, No. 6, July 17, 1996)
By: Joe Lunievicz

Did you know they can staple now? I got two in my head last Saturday. They don't have to do stitches anymore. They can staple your head together (at a relatively low cost in pain and without anesthetic because they can do it quickly). And I didn't even have to take their samples of Bacitracin - I had enough left over from last season when I had eight stitches put in at the Long Island Tournament. I'm a bleeder. What can I tell you? I lead with my nose so I get a few head injuries. That's why they call me Joe Nose. The head is a very important part of your body though. Don't let anyone tell you different.

I was standing on the sideline today, after our game was over, watching another game flow across the pitch at Randalls Island and this player from New Zealand was telling me why he had to wear a scrum cap in our game. I remember he had worn a brand new black scrum cap that glistened like polished obsidian as it aimed for my chest when he had the ball and I had tried to tackle him. You see he had a number of staples holding his brainmatter in (as opposed to letting it out) from an injury in a game he'd played the previous weekend. It seems he had to protect the staples in order to play - hence the scrum cap. It was fascinating logic to me.

Needless to say I felt a little foolish about my two (suddenly diminished in size) staples. They seemed kind of... insignificant. As I've said before - size is important. But the story was also a good one. And let's face it folks, when all is said and done and we're dead and buried or our ashes are scattered across the East River and being bobbed for by mutated fish, that's really all that will be left of us - our stories.

Doing AIDS work in New York City has meant I've been able to hear quite a few people's stories so this has true meaning for me. Sometimes I even wonder, when I'm gone, what kinds of stories people will be telling about me.

Rugby is a visceral game, a sensual game. It reminds me, along with the stories that I hear, that I'm alive. I taste blood in my mouth, or my mouthpiece squeaks against my teeth, or I blow black snot out of my nose, spray steaming urine onto a frost covered field, breathe in clouds of dust on a dry hot day, or spit out wet grass and clods of mud on a rainy one and I know that I'm alive. I think about these kinds of things when the game's over and I'm leaning against the bar, my elbows and knees already stiff and stinging from their various cuts and bruises. I think about this and eavesdrop on the stories being told around me.

"Jason didn't play because he broke his nose last week."

"He didn't?"

"He didn't what?"

"He didn't play."

"Yeah. Because he broke his nose last week. Don't you remember? That guy with the black tape on his ears hammered him in that lineout."

"Right, right. How bad is it?"

"It's bad enough so he didn't play."

"Yeah but not as bad as Garreth's."

"No, not that bad. Garreth's is pretty bad. I mean did you ever look at that thing up close?"

"Yeah well, Garreth's isn't as bad as Joe Nose's."

"Oh no. Definitely not. No one's nose is as bad as his."

"What about Jim's. I heard Jim broke his nose twelve times."

"He did but it still looks okay. I mean his nose is pretty small to begin with. You know what I mean?"

"Yeah and Joe's is... well..."

"Right. Need I say more?"

Then I heard somebody else say, "How many staples?"

And a voice with a New Zealand accent replied, "Hell I've had over a hundred and fifty stitches in my head."

I turned around (after, possibly shouting a four letter word followed by a personal pronoun at my conversing teammates) and looked at the man who had worn the black scrumcap in the game. The scrumcap was off and a good part of his head was shaved, old stitch scars and new staples gleaming with Bacitracin. He was talking to one of my other teammates. I touched the back of my head with two fingers and rubbed the still tender bump I had there.

A crowd was gathering around them as he began to tell his story. I elbowed my way in. A story that good, I figured I could hear again.